News Brief

A group of ultra-right extremists in the Ukrainian town of Kirovograd reportedly planned to blow up a local synagogue.

Sergey Tkachuk, the head of the local Ukrainian Security Service, or SBU, said at a news conference Monday in Kirovograd that leaders of the group, including a former officer of the local law enforcement agency, planned to attack and beat local Jews as well as other minorities of “non-Slavonic appearance” and to blow up Kirovograd’s Choral Synagogue.

According to the SBU, the group included 14 youths, mainly university students aged 18 to 20, who studied Nazi literature.

“They ideologically prepared to commit crimes, studying literature of Nazi Germany and Hitler’s books,” Tkachuk said.

“Some non-identified persons rather often shattered windows of the synagogue and wrote anti-Semitic slogans,” Emma Spektor, the leader of Kirovograd Reform Congregation, told JTA. “We informed SBU about such facts and worked closely with them. We appreciate the fact that SBU unmasked the group of ultra-right extremists and hope they will be punished according to the law.”

SBU identified the group early this year but transferred the materials of the investigation to the local public prosecutors’ office and announced that fact only this week.

It is still not clear what charges the alleged extremists will face.